Driver Settings Help

[John Martelli]

Hi Guys Looking for  advice .  Sonar X1 Studio. I think there may be something wrong with my recording settings or mic. Mixdown does not sound as clear as other projects I hear across the web. Frustrating because a lot of time goes into it and I feel the end result is unuseable. I keep the levels below the red but it still sounds a bit distorted to me.  Settings: Audio Driver Bit Depth 24, Sampling rate 44100, Mixing Latency Buffers in playback Queue 2, Driver Mode Asio, Dithering Rectangular, File system Record I/O Buffer 512kb. PC specs Processor Intel i5-4210u CPU @ 1.70 GHZ  2.40 GHZ. Ram 7.89 GB, 64 Bit operating system, x64 based processor.   Microphone (Dynamic) Sennhieiser E  838 ,  Interface Presonus Audiobox usb 96.  This track is acapella vocals only Any advice would be much appreciated.

rainbow master 1_2.mp3

[John Vere]

First may I ask why you using a outdated version of Cakewalk when the latest version is free?

This alone will help because the improvements are huge since X1. X1 was considered the worst version in the last 20 years 

As far as achieving results the sound like hit records made be professionals in million dollar studios that’s a lifetime quest 

Try watching some of the many videos. The ones by Creative Sauce are real good at this.  
 

And the folks here on this forum can also help but it’s better to ask a specific question about one issue than a general one 

 

But real hard to help when you using software we all left behind years ago. Go ahead and update first it will still keep X1 as you learn about Cakewalk by Bandlab 

[John Vere]

And to answer your OT question, Your settings are fine. Other than the mono issue. Your computer is a bit behind the times and could use a SSD drive and some more RAM to perk it up. 

Just listened to your song and ran some diagnostics on it.  

First the distortion is probably the excessive low end on your vocal mike. There is a lot of mike noise in the low end. Hi pass the vocal track. There's even some banging and mechanical noise like your hitting the mike or the stand. You'll need to use automation or clip trimming to get rid of the noises as well as using hi pass EQ.  Look at picture 2021-02-04 this is before you started singing. The second picture is while song is playing.  Possibly your monitoring system is to blame.  

I took a few screen shots running Span to show you the problem. Your overall mix comes out in the ballpark. And then your master is Mono? and there is too much space at the start and over 4 minutes of silence at end. It looks like your going to need some help with mastering as well. 

[John Martelli]

Spent many hours trying to install Bandlab Cakewalk. No success it hangs on installing watched all videos and tried all suggestions on forums. No luck

[John Martelli]

Solved Bandlab installed after disabling firewalls and antivirus  but it wasn't easy went through many attempts.

[John Vere]

1 hour ago, John Martelli said:

Solved Bandlab installed after disabling firewalls and antivirus  but it wasn't easy went through many attempts.

Good, now your rockin! I was going to recommend that but you said you had tried everything  

Get that going and then lets help you clean up your song. Your not that far away from achieving a good mix.

By the way, what are you using for monitoring?  

[John Martelli]

Hey John thanks again for the reply.  Your right bandlab seems to crash less and has a smoother overall sound. I also went ahead and purchased the audio tecnica at 2020 cheap cardiod mic but it sounds a little better than the dynamic sennheiser I was using. I am using medium grade headphones for monitoring. Im thinking of re recording the vocals with the new hardware and software as the tracks are noisy with poor timing and can be recorded clearer. Quite a task as there are literally a hundred vocal tracks on this project and they need to be better organized for part distribution to vocalists. By the way Im not really a singer I work with legendary vocal harmony recording  groups from the 50s through the 70s who all have had major hit records  and the recording is just for arranging and for vocal part distribution. However I am now challenged to get it to sound better just to be more professional and to be less embarrassed by my vocal abilities as these are among the best harmony singers in the world. I sincerely appreciate the time you took to help.